FBC Daily Devotional – April 5, 2021

Faith Baptist Church

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Well, a good Monday to you. I hope you had a wonderful weekend and Resurrection Sunday, you were able to celebrate the the fact of the the risen

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Savior that he lives, and I'm sure that the day was a special day for you, for your family, for your loved ones.

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I trust it was. I hope you were able to get to church and to worship together with God's people and just celebrate the resurrection of the

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Lord Jesus Christ. I hope it was a good weekend for you. But here we are, it's off to a new week and I hope things get off to a good start for you this week.

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Do you know, as we begin a new week, one of the things that one of the things that can really be an enemy to a fruitful, productive week, and therefore life,

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I guess, is distraction. And my goodness, aren't there plenty of them these days?

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I mean, distractions everywhere. I'm thinking even as I sit here and share this, there is this vulnerability that at any moment this little device sitting off to my side could go off and call for my attention and distract me away from the more important thing that I need to be doing.

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Most likely. I suppose there could be an emergency to crop up, but those rarely happen.

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Usually the distractions are some unwanted spam text or a phone call or something, you know, somebody telling me that my car warranty is about to expire or the

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Social Security Administration is letting me know that my Social Security account has been hacked and is being suspended.

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You know, those things. So those distractions. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Our lives these days are just filled with distractions.

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And we can be pulled away by even good things. Even good things.

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But if it's a good thing that pulls us away from the main thing, the important thing, the one thing that we're called to do and to focus on, then you know, it's a distraction.

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You know, Jesus knew that potential as well, that temptation to be distracted from the main thing.

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And we we read about that in today's Scripture reading in our reading schedule.

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Jesus is just the night before this incident. He has just done some wonderful miracles.

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He healed Peter's mother -in -law and and then when that news got out that he could heal somebody's, you know, of a fever like that, all kinds of people showed up at the door wanting to be helped and wanting to be healed of their infirmities.

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And Jesus took the time to address all of those problems and to take care of all of those needs.

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And finally, after a late night of ministry, everybody crashed, went to sleep.

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But early in the morning, Jesus got up and he went out and he prayed, we're told.

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And then some of the other disciples were stirred and realized Jesus wasn't there, and so they went looking for him.

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And we read in verse 37 of Mark chapter 1 that Simon and those who were with him searched for him and they found him.

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And when they found him, they said to him, everyone is looking for you. Everyone is looking for you.

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And the implication there is that, come on, you need to come with us because all these people want your attention and you need to give them your attention.

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But the way Jesus responded to this is instructive, I think.

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And let me just suggest three things. Number one, he got up early. Number two, he got alone.

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And number three, he prayed. Now what that did was it centered him on his purpose and his mission.

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So that when Peter and, you know, the other disciples came to him and wanted to, you know, distract him and get him off mission, he was able to say, no,

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I'm not going to go with you. We're going to go here and we're going to do this.

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This is what he says. He says, let us go, instead of going with them, he says, let's go into the next towns that I may preach there also.

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Why? Because therefore, for this purpose, I have come forth. See, Jesus was focused on his purpose.

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His purpose wasn't to solve every human infirmity and to heal everybody's sickness and to solve everybody's physical malady.

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That wasn't why he came. Now, he did some of those things along the way to authenticate his message and to authenticate his position as the

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Messiah. But it was not his mission to come into this world and to become a healer for every single person in every single infirmity.

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So he responds and says, no, we're not going to do that. We're going to go elsewhere.

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And so verse 39 says, and he was preaching in their synagogues throughout all Galilee and casting out demons.

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And so off he went. Now, just because we're focused doesn't mean that we should be oblivious to the needs of others or be unconcerned about the needs of others.

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In fact, living with purpose and focus allows for margin.

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So it's not that when Jesus was confronted with Peter's mother -in -law and then all these other townspeople that came to him, that he was then thrown off purpose and he was thrown off kilter and was being distracted from his main purpose.

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No. He had built some margin into his life by just staying on purpose.

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And when you stay on purpose and you accomplish those things in a given place and given time that you're called to do, that gives you some margin to care for and address some other needs.

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And that's evident here as you continue on in our reading, because he went to these other communities, he went to their synagogues, he preached throughout all

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Galilee, cast out demons, but then a leper came to him and implored him, kneeled down and said to Jesus, if you're willing, you can make me clean.

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And Jesus didn't say, oh, I'm sorry, you're taking me off mission here. No. Because he had stayed focused and because he was on mission, there was some margin in his life so that when someone came to him with a need, he was able to take the time and address that need.

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Time and opportunity to show compassion to someone that he could help. Now, again, there's a great deal of wisdom and skill involved in this, but I think you and I know the difference between being distracted and being pulled away to help somebody in need.

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The key to feeling like that is not an intrusion into our time and our energies, is to stay on target, to stay on focus, to stay on mission in the course of our day -to -day life.

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We get those things done that we're called to do, that are our skill set, that are our vocation.

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We stay focused on those things and don't allow meaningless distractions to take us off because then we don't get those things done and then we feel frenetic and feel like we don't have time for anything or anybody.

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And then when somebody comes with a need, we don't want to address it. But now if we stay on mission, keep our purpose in front of us and work on those things as primary and first and foremost, then when a need arises, somebody needs some compassion and some help.

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We've got the margin to express the help and care. Well, I hope that's an encouragement to you to be like Jesus, stay on mission, stay on target.

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So, our Father, as we begin this new week, I pray that you would help us to be a people of purpose, understand what you've called us to do and then give ourselves to it and just to stay focused on that.

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And we pray that as you bring across our path people that need help, by our staying focused and staying on mission, we'll have the margin built into our lives to feel free to help and to help in wonderful, effective ways.

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Well, we pray this in Jesus name. Amen. All right. Well, have a good rest of your

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Monday, and I trust the Lord will get your week off to a good start. Have a good day. God bless.